By Chandler Harris, Assistant Sports Editor
With a new semester comes a new schedule for intramural sports. The intramural department will offer six sports this spring for students, alumni, faculty and staff to compete in. The sports include basketball, volleyball, soccer, golf, a rodeo and a track meet.
“We are very excited to get back to school and hit the ground running with intramurals this semester,” said Danny Kittley, ACU director of intramural sports.
The intramural season will begin Jan. 26 with basketball. The department will offer two separate leagues for people to participate in. For the champ league, a 5-on-5 league will be offered for men and women. One 5-on-5 men’s rec league will be offered while all games will be played on Monday and Tuesday nights in Bennett Gymnasium.
In addition to the 5-on-5 leagues, three 3-on-3-basketball leagues (men’s, women’s and co-ed) will be offered. These leagues will play half-court games with no referees. All calls will have to be made by the players themselves using the honor system, Kittley said.
“We hope that this will be a lot better for the girls,” Kittley said. “The girl’s rec league is usually more for fun than competition, so we think they will enjoy this. If they want more of a competitive game, they can play in the champ league.”
The co-ed 3-on-3 league will consist of two women and one man on the court at all times. Men will guard the men and women will guard other women. All substitutions must be made for the same gender, Kittley said.
Students can play on up to three separate teams, one 5-on-5, one 3-on-3 of the same gender and one 3-on-3 co-ed.
“The co-ed league allows students more opportunities to be active,” Kittley said. “That’s the method to my madness, to allow people to play more of the sports that they want.”
The sign-up deadline for the intramural basketball season is Thursday.
The volleyball season will begin Mar. 17. All volleyball games also will be played in Bennett Gymnasium as opposed to some being played in the Gibson double gymnasiums like last year.
Also in March, a 7-on-7 soccer tournament will be played on the ACU women’s soccer field. The 120×75-yard field will give students a different format than the 4-on-4 style that they played in the fall.
April will bring a two-man golf scramble, the ACU rodeo and a track meet. This will be the first intramural track meet since 2003.
“That year we had 300 participants and we are looking forward to offering this event again,” Kittley said.
He said the meet will be over a two-day span to allow runners to compete in multiple events without getting as tired.
The meet will consist of six relay races (4×100, 4×200, 4×400, 4×800, sprint medley relay and distance medley relay) and two individual races to be voted on by the club intramural directors later this spring.
